René Wohlhauser presents Kasamarówa, vocal chamber works performed by the Duo Simolka-Wohlhauser. René Wohlhauser is an internationally active and creative composer and interpreter. In 2013, the label NEOS began its CD series "Wohlhauser Edition". Wohlhauser (composition, piano, baritone, conductor) was born in 1954 and grew up in Brienz, Switzerland. Experiences as a rock and jazz musician, accompanist and improviser have accompanied and continue to accompany his principal activity as a composer of contemporary art music (including chamber, orchestral and stage works). He received his training at the Basel Academy of Music, studying with Robert Suter, Jacques Wildberger and Thomas Kessler, also attending composition courses with Kazimierz Serocki, Mauricio Kagel, Herbert Brün and Heinz Holliger. Duo Simolka-Wohlhauser, from Basel, specializes in the interpretation of contemporary vocal music and carries out annual tours of Switzerland and various major European cities (e.g. Basel, Bern, Zurich, Stuttgart, Munich, Hamburg, Berlin, Paris, Salzburg). Its fundamental concern is to bring current vocal works from the field of contemporary music to the stage, and thus give the genre new impulses for further development.

The third release in Neos's collaboration with Swiss composer René Wohlhauser, featuring solo piano by German pianist Moritz Ernst. Ernst's unusually broad repertoire extends from baroque virginal pieces to modern works, and he often switches between harpsichord and piano in the same concert. In the field of contemporary music, he works with leading composers (including Klaus Huber, Sandeep Bhagwati, Wolfgang Rihm, Michael Pelzel, Jimmie LeBlanc, Miklós Maros, Kent Olofsson, and Michael Edgerton), who often dedicate pieces to him. As well as focusing on Rameau, Handel, Beethoven, Haydn, Brahms, Busoni, and Debussy, Ernst also champions unknown or forgotten composers. He has demonstrated this with his recording of Malcolm Arnold's piano works ("a sparkling and stimulating interpretation" --Gramophone) and the complete edition of the surviving sonatas by Viktor Ullmann and Norbert von Hannenheim on EDA, which has been termed a reference recording. This release comes in advance of Ernst's Canadian debut in the 2015/'16 season, as well as performances with the German Radio Philharmonic and extensive recordings for DeutschlandRadio.

The second release of the "Wohlhauser Edition" combines another seven works by the composer, conductor, baritone and pianist René Wohlhauser, played by the Ensemble Polysono during their European tours between 2008 and 2012. In the piano quartet, Wohlhauser attempted to compose the dimension of depth, which led to a compacted musical duration, a form of "textural polyphony." The title "Duometrie" points to the fact that the composer developed the entire music of this duo from predetermined meters, i.e., from time signatures defined in advance. "Gedankenflucht": Different moods that flow into one another. A piece about distraction by the daily flood of information. "Quantenströmung": In the work of Gilles Deleuze, "quantum flow" refers to the transition from one energy state to another. Of the various forms of energy, the ones that interested Wohlhauser most in this piece were potential and kinetic energy. "Die Auflösung der Zeit in Raum": A piece about the disappearance of temporal experience in the infinitude of space. "Studie über Zustände und Zeitprozesse": The piece plays with human perception in relation to the passing of time, in that human perception often creates connections where almost none are present. "Ly-Gue-Tin," a (not entirely serious)-sounding work monograph for voice(s) and piano sounds, composed for the inauguration of the life tables of Jean Tinguely (May 22, 1925-August 30, 1991) in Basel on his 83rd birthday, using phonopoetic texts by the composer.

For soprano, baritone and chamber ensemble, to sound poems by the composer. Performed by Ensemble Polysono. René Wohlhauser is an unusual artist: composer, pianist, baritone, conductor, born in 1954, grew up in Brienz/Switzerland. Experiences as a rock and jazz musician, lied accompanist and improviser. Educated at the Music Academy in Basle, studying with Robert Suter, Jacques Wildberger, and Thomas Kessler, also attending composition courses with Kazimierz Serocki, Mauricio Kagel, Herbert Brün and Heinz Holliger. There followed studies in composition with Klaus Huber and Brian Ferneyhough, further piano studies with Stéphane Reymond and vocal studies with David Wohnlich and Robert Koller. In 2004, the world premiere of the opera Gantenbein was given at the Lucerne Theatre. In recent years Wohlhauser has repeatedly undertaken tours in Europe as pianist, singer and conductor with the Simolka-Wohlhauser Duo and his own Ensemble Polysono. He was a guest lecturer for composition at the International Summer Courses in Darmstadt (1988-1994), at the Festival in Odessa (1996-1998), and at the International Composers' Atelier in Lugano (2000). A composer deeply committed to cultural politics, he teaches composition, music theory and improvisation at the Basle Music Academy (and until 1991 at the Lucerne Academy) and at the SAMP/Kalaidos Music Academy. His conviction: no one can know everything. Our knowledge in its fragmentary constellation characterizes our attitude to life and our points of view, which often behave contrarily to the points of view of other people with a different fragmentary experience of life. Human behavior as a consequence of fragments of fallen knowledge. What does this mean, then, in terms of composition? Creating complex microstructures, working with fragments from a fragmentary world that coalesce to form new sonic conglomerates that perhaps open up new experiences and points of view to the public.